Grant Rants

Jupiter is a badass. Like Shaft in space.

What a friend we have in Jupiter. You know Zeus Jupiter? King of the gods, wielder of the lightning, womanizer to end all womanizers and general purveyor of badassry? You know, this guy:

Well, ok. Not exactly. I am actually referring the largest planet in the solar system:

Not a womanizer and it doesn’t smite mortals with bolts of lightning, but Jupiter is still a badass. See, because of a lucky twist of fate, this massive ball of gas is so big — I’m talking at least a few times larger than a double Big Mac – that is sucks up all kind of space debris that would otherwise slam into Earth. Like comets, meteors, derelict Reapers. Essentially we get to worry a whole lot less about having an asteroid harsh our day because the big guy is always on duty.

Essentially Jupiter acts as a kind of galactic shield for us. Its gravitational influence is so huge, that a lot of stuff that might otherwise slam into us and, you know, kill everything, never gets close.

So tonight, look up into the sky and give thanks to Jupes. He’s always got our back and never asks for anything in return. Swell guy.

PS. It always annoyed me, though, that the planet got named Jupiter instead of Zeus. Jupiter is just the Roman name for the Greek king of the gods, Zeus, which just has a more impressive sound to it. Say it. “Zeus.” oooh gave you chills didn’t it?

3 comments

If you know your mythology, “J”, you’d know that Zeus (Jupiter if you’re Roman) was constantly getting into trouble because of his frequent dalliances with mortal women. His wife got so annoyed by it she tried to kill one of the children that resulted from Zeus’ adultry (Herakles) and even caused her to try and overthrow him as the king of Olympus.

In anycase, this is short piece about the amazing nature of our universe, and rape isn’t mentioned. Although by your comment, I am going to assume you are one of those who objected to my recent column on the “Don’t Be That Guy” campaign.